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Topic: Moving shop again (again)... (Read 18518 times)

Some of you may have gathered from some of my other posts that I am moving to a new workshop. Again. Fourth time now... it's getting a bit tedious, so I'm hoping to be in this new one for a good few years. Tried to move out of my current one a couple of years back, but had to abort & come back due to the new place being constantly flooded - including a gigantic hole right over the electric board, so everything shorted out every time it rained. Which it does a lot, up here in t'frozen North...

So, anyhoo, here's the new spread (all pictures can be embiggened by clicking):

3600 sq/ft of leaky roof and pigeon shít. Nice.

I'm sharing this with a couple of other lads, so I get 3/4 of the place (about 2700sq/ft, or 250sq/m for those who calculate in French). 100sq/m of that space is upstairs on the mezzanine.

One of the many water features... This one has now been fixed, and new OSB laid across (most of) the old floor. That was the only real weak spot upstairs, it's been leaking so long most of the glue/bonding/whatever it is in the OSB had been washed away, the water was dripping straight through!

That grey stuff is not insulation. It is, genuinely, pigeon shít. There were about 1/2 dozen pigeons in there when we moved in, all since shot & fed to the cats/foxes. The place has been empty for many years, mainly due to the leaking roof, dangerous electrics, and inch-deep coating of pigeon poo. Oh, and the fact that the council wanted to charge rates on the place! Well, since that nice Mr Osborne (former UK finance minister, for those scratching their heads) changed the rates rules, the place will be zero rated as of next year & for the foreseeable future. Which is nice.

Aaaanyway, fast forward 5 months, and this is what it looks like now:

The eagle-eyed amongst you will notice there's not many machine tools in evidence.... they're still at the old place, should have them in by/just after Christmas (I hope!)

Meantime, I've spent the last 2 weekends buying wood, then screwing it all together:

This will be the new office (byebye Portacabin, you've served me well, but I can't lift you onto the mezzanine you're just too damn heavy & fragile). Got 1 more main wall to build, but I can't do that until I've got the window(s) and door(s). Maybe next weekend... Note the shiny new OSB. And the black rubber mat where it still leaks a bit

One of the old welding bays (visible in the 1st pic, on the RHS about 1/2 way down) currently full of "clutter" (Mr Wilson might recognise some of it )

The roof isn't quite there yet either:

Yes, all 5 buckets are needed... there's a 6th just out of shot too! New plan is to fit some internal under-roofing which will catch the water & channel it away.

Anyway... I'll have a smashing big workshop when I'm finished - over 1000sq/ft for the lathes/mills and other sundry machine tools, and all tucked away under the mezzanine where it should be possible to keep them reasonably warm even in the middle of winter (I plan a giant sliding door in front of the mezzanine, so access is still easy, but any warmth stays in there), approx 400sq/ft office space up on the mezzanine (the dimensions are 100% driven by the requirements of the pool table!!) with the rest given over to storage, and around another 800sq/ft ish for cars/race car stuff.

All in all, I'm aching from head to foot but rather pleased with myself just now

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

That's quite some space Ade You've been busy - is the travelling crane still functional?

Unfortunately the crane has been stripped of everything electrical (apart from the bare copper wires that used to power it!!! That gert big I-beam that's visible in the first "office" picture did have 4x 1/4 inch bare conductors stretched along it. Talk about a lethal hazard! Will use the forge to make copper ingots out of them, then either weigh them in or keep them as mementos). However, all the crane really needs is a motor, and a gearwheel, and it could be made to move again. The original hook and traverse mechanism's all gone, and has been replaced with a simple hand-moved hanger (visible in 2nd pic, with the chains hanging down). I'd hang my 1 ton electric hoist off that, although it would be nice to have an electric traverse.

Anyway, it's on the "one day" list... Biggest change would have to be moving the stops, left as is it could crash into the shelves/office!

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Friend of mine has a travelling crane, in fact the girlfriend built it for him.

What they have done is to park it halfway down the carriageway and fit one of those 1/4 ton Lidl hoists onto the beam.Cable goes from one end of the building about 5 times round the winch capstan and then goes to the other end where it's tightened up.

Works that well he's in the process of fitting one to the lift carriage for side to side movement.

Friend of mine has a travelling crane, in fact the girlfriend built it for him.

What they have done is to park it halfway down the carriageway and fit one of those 1/4 ton Lidl hoists onto the beam.Cable goes from one end of the building about 5 times round the winch capstan and then goes to the other end where it's tightened up.

Works that well he's in the process of fitting one to the lift carriage for side to side movement.

Hmmm, interesting...

I may need more than a 1/4 ton winch to move the whole beast (it's pretty sturdy looking), but that'd be ideal for the side-to-side. Thanks! Another one for the ever-lengthening to-do list!

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Thanks Pete - it's involved a LOT of brushing, jetwashing, more brushing & more jetwashing, several gallons of paint and many many hours... and there's still a long way to go! e.g. there's still piles of pigeon crap under the mezzanine which needs sweeping up... ideally before the machines arrive...

Still, the good news is, it no longer stinks when the roof leaks!

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Your're certainly sinking a lot of time, effort and materials into the new place Ade - have you bought it or are you renting it? If renting is your landlord obliged to do any repairs or is it a full 'repairing / insuring' lease ?

Thanks chaps, it certainly is a nice place to have. Not the cheapest in the world... but pretty cheap considering the size, despite the colander-like roof... I can't claim credit for most of the prettyfication, the other chaps have done a lot of painting & decorating... and we have a sparky doing the re-wire (all to code and everything).

Andrew - it's only rented unfortunately. Buying is currently beyond my means... hopefully, if I've got my budget about right, I'll be in a position to buy sometime in the next 4-5 years, but I'll just keep on saving until we get kicked out of this place, the longer I can stay here, the more of a deposit I can build up towards purchasing. The rent is on the basis that you leave the place "no worse" than you found it. In fairness, the landlord is paying for me to "fix" the roof... but if push came to shove & we insisted on having the roof replaced (which is what it needs), they'd just refuse & condemn the building. One day, the whole site is going to get sold to a developer, and that'll be us on notice.

Rob: Yep, but as you know from your last visit, I do rather need the space (either that, or I need to massively downsize... and I just can't bring myself to do that). No ducking under low flying cars to get to the office in this place! Well... hopefully not anyway... Not at first.

Ian - Interesting, I hadn't considered a plastic curtain... A sliding door would be easy enough to construct - 10 sheets of OSB, some castor wheels, and some kind of guide rail.... but plastic would be quicker & easier. No fire issues we need to worry about, the place is so damp I don't think it would support combustion! Unfortunately (or fortunately? ) most of the pigeon dung ended up being shoveled down the drain & flushed away... stinky horrid stuff. Most of what remains is either on top of the office, doubling up as insulation, or on top of the remnants of the welding bay roof... frankly I can't see my selling it, It'll go down the drain with the rest of the ick I think.

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Just got the door frame to finish, then 18 off 6x2 by 4.2m ceiling joists to lift just over 8ft in the air, then I can start plasterboarding.... not looking forward to that, unless I can beg/borrow/steal a plasterboard lifter from somewhere...

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Just got the door frame to finish, then 18 off 6x2 by 4.2m ceiling joists to lift just over 8ft in the air, then I can start plasterboarding.... not looking forward to that, unless I can beg/borrow/steal a plasterboard lifter from somewhere...

If you had a mate going to Snetterton, I have a board lifter just up the road from there. It's such a pleasure to be able to position a board accurately, without someone saying " 'aven't you dun it yet!".Pete

A little more progress today, all the ceiling joists (for the main part of the office) are up; only 3 left to do, but until I build the door frame, I can't put them in place; and I can't build the door frame until I know how big the door is.... just waiting on the measurements from the seller, and another few bits of timber from Wickes. Andrew - I agree, they're not exactly the best wood I've ever worked with, but as far as I am concerned all wood is inhabited by evil spirits which cause splinters, splitting, warping, twisting and other nefarious effects. Oh, and why is it there's always a knot just where you need to saw/drill/screw the damn stuff? Give me metal any day of the week, at least it behaves relatively consistently. So long as you don't have to weld it of course...

Pekka.... I feel your pain.... I have approx 50 sheets of drywall, about the same size, to manhandle upstairs. At least I don't have to worry about corners though! Then there's another 14 or so sheets of OSB to go up to form the roof, and a big roll of EPDM to spread over that.... this is to contain the remaining small leaks which continue to plague the roof.

After that, there is the relatively minor job of carpet tiling the entire room, fitting all the electrics, fitting the beer pump the dartboard, leveling the pool table, searching ebay for a fruit machine....

I suppose I ought to carry on building my racing car at some point!

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73

Come on Ade - you're a software whiz, and you've now got a CNC lathe. Bar feeder + a set of G-code macros + random-number front end = press the button and lathe will churn out a set of fruit! Far more fun than watching pictures of fruit on painted wheels.

Come on Ade - you're a software whiz, and you've now got a CNC lathe. Bar feeder + a set of G-code macros + random-number front end = press the button and lathe will churn out a set of fruit! Far more fun than watching pictures of fruit on painted wheels.

LOL! An interesting prospect for sure.... but that does involve getting the CNC lathe to work, currently not feasible... Still, there's plenty of other jobs to be getting along with.

So... this week I picked up the window, and discovered they'd measured it wrong Fortunately, the height is good, and the window is narrower than the opening I made for it, so it fits right in. I'll make another "cripple stud" to run up alongside it, and no-one will ever know. Then, whilst manoevering a sheet of plasterboard, I managed to knock into one of the end walls, nudging it off the floor and down below Oh well, I needed to extend it anyway, as I'd made it about a foot too short...

Anyway, the upshot of this weekends labours is this:

This building lark isn't as easy as I thought it would be! Still, it's all more-or-less square and straight, +/- about 1/2 inch. Although as we can see, the window isn't quite spot on:

The vendor's listing said 2500mm wide, actually it's 2050mm. Doh! Easy mistake to make I suppose.

Also missing: One door...

I'm not planning an "L" shaped door, but the one I have on order I'm a bit concerned about the height - just 1975mm. If it really IS only that high, then I'll be banging my head walking through it... I need at least 2.1m height for safe entry! I suppose I could just screw a 125mm extension to the bottom of it, once it's all painted, no-one will ever know...

Insulation would be the next conundrum.... it ain't cheap, specifically I reckon I could easily spend as much as I've already spent, and that's buying the cheap stuff. If I went for building code stuff, it'd be double again... Or do I just by pass the electric meter & run the heating 24x7.......

Anyway, that's it for a couple of weeks, business trip next weekend, any readers local to Orlando?

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Cheers!Ade.--Location: Wallasey, Merseyside. A long way from anywhere.Or: Zhengzhou, China. An even longer way from anywhere...Skype: adev73